


Intimacy

by SweetPollyOliver



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: F/M, Falling In Love, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Will is standing aside to do the honorable thing, Worf and Deanna have different ideas about what constitutes oversharing, but ends up with a girlfriend and a boyfriend instead, everyone is bi, love as a vehicle for more love, significantly less jealousy than canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-08
Updated: 2016-08-08
Packaged: 2018-08-07 12:01:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7714159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SweetPollyOliver/pseuds/SweetPollyOliver
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Worf ruminates on the fact that he knows Will Riker far intimately through Deanna Troi's reminiscences of him than he ever expected to know him and how loving and being loved by the same person bonds them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Intimacy

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a pinch hit for pansexualjulianbashir for round 2 of trek-rarepair-swap

There was a kind of shocking intimacy with romantic relationships that extended far beyond the individual with whom you were having the relationship. Not only were you privy to their most private thoughts and dreams and moments of sweet vulnerability… you were privy to those of their previous partners. 

Worf was not quite sure he liked how much he knew about the morning routine of Commander Riker. 

Information that Worf could only have known otherwise if he had himself been in an intimate relationship with the ship’s first officer had been passed carelessly and casually into his hands by Deanna in the middle of unrelated anecdotes. Sometimes she would see something that struck her as hilarious and he would, all innocence, ask for her to elaborate and then be treated to fresh intelligence about the joys and pitfalls of courting William T. Riker. Worf felt that he could possibly write a book on the subject, at this point, for future potential Mrs. Rikers to consult. 

It was not that he was jealous. He did not even really mind that Deanna had as much as told him that a part of her would always love Will. It seemed churlish of him to begrudge her that when a very large part of him would always love K'ehleyr. 

No, what bothered him was the unearned familiarity of it all. Knowing the individual habits and quirks of Deanna was terrifyingly private as it was--bordering on having knowledge of obscure religious practices that were restricted to the holiest and most devout of monks--but it also had a sense of rightness to it. She was showing these parts of herself to him by choice and it was a heartbreakingly moving privilege. 

When he had told her this she'd laughed and said that she was glad he found such profundity in knowledge of the fact that her quarters were always a little messy when she wasn't expecting anyone over who didn't already know she was a slob. 

He did not mind her irreverence on the subject. To a person who came from a race of empaths and telepaths, it must seem a little silly to treat every new thing he learned about her as a revelation. But for him it felt barely hyperbolic at all to treat it that way. 

Which was where his problem with reconciling his newfound and unsought for knowledge of Commander Riker came in. It was not right for him to know the things he knew now. And yet to truly know Deanna he could not _not_ learn them. She would carry Will Riker inside of her forever and to know her was to know her past with him.

Worf’s traditionalist heart mused on the thought that the practice of being involved with only one person for one's entire life and marrying them as soon as possible did carry with it the distinct advantage that they would take your secrets to the grave. 

Perhaps that was what bothered him? That Deanna herself may learn him in his entirety and carry him in her heart and then if she ever gave her heart to another that _they_ in their turn would know him in ways that only a lover should. 

And, on the balance of probability, if his relationship with Deanna were to ever end, she would most likely at some point resume her romantic relationship with Riker… and then he and Riker would each have unearned knowledge of each other. A proxy romance, through their shared love of the same woman.

The notion was… deeply unsettling in a way that he couldn't solely attribute to his appalled sense of privacy. 

His discomfort was not something that he was alone with for long. Deanna, for reasons that were fairly self evident, could always tell when something was bothering him and it did not take her long to tease it out of him. 

"Worf…" she said, a little uncertainly. "You do know that I tell Will these things anyway?" 

He felt the bottom drop out of his stomach abruptly, even as he realised that he had perhaps been foolish to think that his emotionally open and gregarious mate wouldn't have discussed specifics of their relationship with the man she shared such a lasting and close bond with.

"Nothing of an intimate nature!" she clarified quickly. "But, you know… little things. Like how you always wake up before me and clean the bathroom sink when you stay the night and what your favourite operas are and things like that." 

It was remarkable how differently two people could interpret the phrase 'things of an intimate nature.'

"He is… aware that I have stayed in your quarters overnight?" Worf said from a thousand light years away. 

"Well…" Deanna raised her shoulders and grimaced at him apologetically. "It wasn't my intention to make you feel uncomfortable. I just… it would never even _occur_ to me to be as private about my life as you are about yours! Particularly with Will. And now, well, our lives are… connected." 

She wove the fingers of both her hands together between them to illustrate her meaning. 

"Yes," Worf replied at length. "I understand. I would not… I do not wish for you to feel that you have to censor yourself or be someone you are not for me. However I admit that this is something that I'm having some difficulty with." 

"I understand too," Deanna said. "And I'll try to be more circumspect. I can maintain my relationship with Will without it being at the expense of your peace of mind."

"Thank you," he said. "And I will try to be less perturbed by Commander Riker's knowledge of my musical database. I do not want you to feel that you cannot talk about our relationship at all. I entertain some fondness for the idea that being with me makes you happy… and you enjoy talking about things that make you happy." 

They smiled at each other and he reached out to squeeze her joined hands lightly.

*

The thing was, that having had this conversation, he could not help but imagine the ensuing conversation that Deanna must have had with Will about how she was trying to be more private for his sake. If it had felt before like the two of them were in a pseudo romantic relationship through their connection to Deanna, it now felt as though he had broken up with him. He felt like a bit of a heel. 

This was what came from romanticising the exchange of second hand information, he supposed. 

*

Will Riker slid into the barstool next to him in Ten Forward and Worf's mind eye swam with a constructed image of him grumpy and half asleep, wrapped in bedsheets and reaching out a hand to pull him (Deanna, pull Deanna) back into bed with him. 

"Lieutenant," he said amiably and Worf nodded with his heart thundering. "Guinan, an Andorian ale for me and another… prune juice is it? Another prune juice for Mr. Worf."

"Thank you," Worf said stiffly.

"Maybe it'll loosen you up," Riker smiled broadly and chuckled at his own feeble witticism. 

"Most amusing," Worf allowed a little sarcasm to enter his tone. But he had to admit that as a tension breaking device, it had worked; he was feeling more at ease. 

"Deanna says you've been feeling a little uncomfortable about me," Riker said, as casually as if he were discussing the weather. Worf said nothing. "I just want you to know that I'm not going to make trouble. I love Deanna and I always will, but I'm not her keeper and I respect her too much to think I know what she wants better than she does. And-"

"I think," Worf interjected quickly. "I think that you have misunderstood the nature of my discomfort. I am not jealous of your bond with Deanna." 

"Oh?" Riker raised an eyebrow. "You wouldn't be the first, you know? There's no shame in it." 

"Nevertheless, I am quite sincere when I say that I have no problem with the fact that your history with Deanna is an important part of her. One that can never be erased. You were her first love; in any culture that bond is special and in hers it is all the more so. Especially as you are still a part of her life. And I would not have it any other way."

"Oh really?" Riker smiled widely again.

"We are made up of our experiences," Worf said. "If she had not experienced loving you then she would not be the Deanna Troi who I love today." 

"You never cease to astound me, Mr. Worf," Riker said, with a twinkle in his eye that Worf could not deny that he found affecting. 

*

"Worf…" Deanna said with a questioning tone in her voice. He looked up from the padd he had been trying to read for the past hour. The sentences were all blurring together and he couldn't get past the first paragraph. 

"Yes?" he replied. 

"I've spoken to you about my relationships with women, right?" she asked, to which he nodded. "And… I don't suppose… you maybe found anything I said at all… relatable maybe?" 

"Deanna, I am perfectly aware that I am bisexual," Worf said.

"Oh good!" she sat down beside him heavily. "I was worried I was going to have to tell you." 

"What brought this on?" he asked curiously. She turned to him with her head tipped to one side and a half smirk. He could feel the ghost of an image being projected from her mind to his. 

"Oh, upon the sword of Kahless!" he said. "Is a man not to have a moment's privacy in his own head?" 

"I haven't even said anything yet," she said with an even bigger smile. "But I think it's great!" 

"You do?" Worf said skeptically. "You think it is 'great' that I have… _feelings_ for your ex-boyfriend?" 

"Of course!" she said with the same inexplicable enthusiasm. 

"I suppose I should not find this surprising," Worf said. "I'm relatively certain that I contracted these emotions from you. It is not unlike a father experiencing sympathy pains when his wife goes into labour, I imagine." 

She laughed and hid her head in his shoulder as she swung her legs onto his lap sideways, one at a time. 

"Worf?" she asked, biting her lip, when she reemerged. "I'd like you to know that you don't have to agree to anything I'm about to say or even know what your opinion is right away. And we can agree not to talk about it again if that's what you'd like, but… I’ve been thinking and I’d like to discuss something with you.”

He looked into her undisguisedly excited face and thought he saw the shape of what was coming. And if he was right… he found the notion less outlandish than he’d have thought he would

*

Watching Will Riker throwing a strange oval American football for Alexander in the holodeck, ruffling his hair and patting him on the back when he mastered a spiral throw, made Worf's heart catch unexpectedly. 

Alexander's bond with Deanna had been solid from well before she and Worf initiated a relationship and, once they had, he had been delighted to spend more time with her and his father. But Worf had been apprehensive that introduction of Will into their lives in a more… personal context would upset the delicate ecosystem of his relationship with his son. However, with a few minor and (Deanna assured him) very normal moments of imbalance while they approached a new equilibrium together, things seemed to be turning out very well. 

Will jogged over to where Worf was sitting with Deanna on the field and gave them a quick kiss on the cheek in turn. 

"Are you two going to join in or just sit around looking pretty?" he asked.

"We're manning the water cooler. It's a very important job," Deanna said with a serene smile in return while she held Worf's hand loosely on the grass between them.

"Both of you are?" Will tilted his head towards Worf and focused the full power of his charm on him for one full unsportsmanlike second while smiling rakishly. Worf sighed and kissed Deanna on the cheek himself and released her hand before standing up. 

"Alexander!" he called out across the simulated field. "Come over here! You've been learning this game for half an hour longer than I have, you can teach me what you have learned." 

Will slung an arm around his hips and gave him a squeeze while they stood and waited together.

**Author's Note:**

> Currently unbeta-ed, so feel free to pick any nits you see


End file.
